GoonWaffe

Goonswarm Federation

I'm here to tell you about an exciting new phase of the behavior correction program Goonswarm is sponsoring for the benefit of the EVE Community.

We've all grown to loathe the highsec miner - entitled, bleating that he deserves to mine in perfect safety in highsec. Demanding that highsec be made safe, that his hulk be buffed, and anyone who would be so unthinking and savage must be banned from the game. Hulkageddon V was a resounding sucess: cutting highsec mining in half and butchering over one trillion isk worth of ships. Hulkageddon: Infinity has continued this work, tearing those miners who had merely hid in a station for a month before bringing out their completely untanked hulk they wanted to afk in to shreads and causing nearly another trillion isk worth of destruction. This has been a fantastic educational program for the EVE community, and with your help we can make it even better.

Now, as you may have heard, our joint efforts against miners has caused a number of these pigeons of eve to flock to covetors. They reason that, because a covetor contains no technetium, that they will be safe from harm and able to once again mine in the absolute safety they crave. That people ganking them are the small-minded isk per hour cretins they surround themselves with. Secure in the knowledge that it would not be profitable to scourge them, they have taken to mining untanked, unaligned, afk: the very definition of the entitled human bot we have all grown to loathe.

We know that's not the case, and that's why we're proud to announce Hulkageddon Infinity: Jr. League. For every 10 mining barges - covetors, retrievers, and procurers - you gank, you will be reimbursed 25 million isk. This is more than enough to fit the 10 t1 fit destroyers needed. Now, of course, we'll continue paying you for the exhumers you gank: we would hate to slacken the pace of the exhumer slaughter. But if you find a field of covetors all busily botting away, there's no longer any need to leave them alone while you hunt down an exhumer to kill! Due to their weaker tank, they can be killed with a pure t1 destroyer - no need to fit t2, allowing you to continue your ganking indefinitely on the mining barge bounty. In fact, some mining barges are so lightly tanked that if you're willing to make the sacrifice and go -10, you can pod them with the very same destroyer that killed their ship and bask in the +5s and +5% mining implants they had plugged in. Many of these people believe that people cannot actually be podded in empire: the stern thrashing given by destroying their alpha clone may even prevent them from such activity in the future as they lose skillpoints.

We hope that by extending this behavior correction program to mining barges as well, we will finally reach those poor deluded souls that can be saved from venturing down the path of mining and to dissuade young impressionable eve players from making this terrible choice to begin with. With your help, and your vicious flogging of miners, we can make EVE a better place, where nobody mines peacefully, unaware of the world.

Payouts will be handled in the same way as regular Hulkageddon Infinity bounties: we are upgrading our software as we speak and the Jr. League bounties will begin immediately.

edit:

MiserySignals wrote:

Weaselior wrote:

Due to their weaker tank, they can be killed with a pure t1 destroyer - no need to fit t2, allowing you to continue your ganking indefinitely on the mining barge bounty. In fact, some mining barges are so lightly tanked that if you're willing to make the sacrifice and go -10, you can pod them with the very same destroyer that killed their ship and bask in the +5s and +5% mining implants they had plugged in. Many of these people believe that people cannot actually be podded in empire: the stern thrashing given by destroying their alpha clone may even prevent them from such activity in the future as they lose skillpoints.

Honestly once you're going for t1 mining ships its not a question of "what do I need to kill it" as "how many can I kill at once". My record is 4, but there were only 4 in the belt. In any case this has the potential to be more profitable than ganking exhumers since you can earn a payout every 2-3 GCCs.

Head of the Goonswarm Economic Warfare Cabal Pubbie Management and Exploitation Division.

State War Academy

Here is how CCP has decided to throw the monkey wrench in the works! Looks like the Goons initiative has been too successful and has resulted in the "renbalance" of mining ships. Good job everyone for the successful campaign against miners!!! (not sarcasm)

Our goal is simple: each and every single mining barge (and their tech 2 variant) should have an appealing role, and not just be a stepping stone on the way to something better. Players should'nt only aim for the Hulk without considering anything else when doing some hard rock and roll mining. That means playing with the following variables:

Mining output: first and most visible balancing factor, plan is to increase all barge mining output to be within an acceptable margin of the Hulk, not miles behind as it is currently. Autonomy: mining barges should have proper cargo holds so they not always have to rely on jet cans (without turning them into industrials however). That means giving them large, specialized ore bays where all the ore will automatically go into when mining. Resilience: another point is to give some of them proper EHP not to be one-shot by anything that even remotely sneezes on them.

As a result we thus get:

New ORE frig: we want this ship to replace current mining frigates as low barrier of entry vessel, but also fulfill high-end gameplay expectations by providing a very mobile platform for mining in hostile space. Lowest mining output, decent ore bay, little to no resilience.

Procurer/Skiff: primarily made for self-defense. Better mining rate than the ORE frig, good ore bay, but capable of having battleship-like EHP.

Retriever/Mackinaw: made for self-reliance. Has the largest ore bay, similear to the size of a jet can, second best mining output but less EHP than the procurer mining barge.

Covetor/hulk: ore bay is identical to its current cargo hold, little to average EHP, but best mining output. Basically made for group operations when players have industrials and protection to back them up.

As you can see, CCP is now taking a closer look at the mining ship class to make risk/reward the focus of the profession.